


Tattered Smile

by IcyPanther



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Human Experimentation, Hurt Lance (Voltron), Lance (Voltron) Angst, Lance (Voltron) Whump, Platonic Relationships, Protective Shiro (Voltron), Shiro (Voltron) Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-16 20:28:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29706141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IcyPanther/pseuds/IcyPanther
Summary: Shiro and Lance are captured by aliens who have a desire to know everything there is about other alien species. To Shiro’s horror, Lance is their favorite target of the two and nothing he says or does will change that. All he can do is try to comfort Lance through the cell wall while Lance tries to keep both of their spirits up. But as the days go by Shiro can feel his own smiles wearing thin and the hopelessness and failure is staring to weigh heavy.
Relationships: Lance & Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 182
Kudos: 270





	Tattered Smile

**Author's Note:**

> **Please read the author's notes at the end of this fic. Thank you :)**
> 
> **Timeline notes:** mid-season one  
>  **Warning notes:** references to some violence, injury description

The _thud_ Lance’s body made followed by the boy’s groan as he was dropped into the cell next to Shiro’s, while it had him wincing, was always followed by a shuddering breath of relief.

Because it meant Lance had come back.

So many didn’t.

And it was slowly killing Shiro that there was nothing he could do about it.

He’d tried, but…

He pulled his attention from his broken left leg— at least it didn’t hurt much now unless he made the mistake of moving it — and focused instead on Lance, who had been by far the favorite target of the aliens. Norians, they had introduced themselves, seekers of knowledge. They would enjoy studying them, they’d grinned, pincers clicking. 

They would learn _everything_ about them.

Which, as Shiro had learned, literally meant everything.

What their species was, their histories, what they were made up of, how they reacted, how they moved, what they could and could not eat, how fast they could run, their sensitivity to light, what happened if they did _this,_ and from Shiro’s best guess they were using Lance as their main test subject and Shiro as a baseline.

He’d pleaded with them to hurt him instead, to inject him instead, because Lance was up in space because of him, they’d been captured because of Shiro, but the Norians had only laughed and otherwise ignored him and Shiro had the sickening reason he knew why.

His gaze drifted to where his right arm was missing.

He tried not to remember the pain as the Norians removed it.

He wasn’t entirely successful and even now it throbbed and ached and he tried not to look at the bloodied port left behind.

So Shiro turned his attention to where it mattered most.

“Lance?” Shiro called softly, knocking his left fist against the solid metal cell wall that separated them and Shiro was just grateful the walls were thin enough they could hear another.

It was a curse in other ways though as the sounds of agony from aliens all around them were a constant nightmarish lullaby.

And while Shiro wished he could see Lance, to assess for himself how the other boy was doing… he was almost glad Lance couldn’t see him. Shiro didn’t feel like a leader, looked a mess, and no matter how hard he tried to do so he could feel his smiles falling flat and fake as the days wore on and he didn’t want Lance to see that.

“Pr-present,” came Lance’s breathless, pained wheeze.

Shiro didn’t speak again, letting Lance regain his breath, the answer enough for now. 

At least Lance wasn’t crying and he was indeed mentally present.

He hated too that that was how he ranked the sessions for the day. So far at least though these aliens seemed more content to ask questions and study them without more drastic, permanent measures. Other than Shiro’s prosthetic they had not yet lost any limbs (and Shiro knew from the alien that used to be in the cell across from him the aliens did indeed take body parts) although what they were putting _into_ them (Lance) had Shiro the most worried. 

Lance had been delirious yesterday from whatever it had been, babbling, often times in Spanish, and even when he had spoken in English the words had made no sense. All he’d been able to determine was that Lance sounded _scared_ and Shiro had spent the day — night? he had no concept of time anymore after what by his best guess was about a week of being trapped here— gently speaking and singing and humming and anything that might calm Lance down and let him know he wasn’t alone.

His heart had broken as through the mumbling and the crying he’d heard one word.

_Mamá._

And as terrible as listening to Lance in that state had been, at least he’d known that Lance, as scared as he was, was alive. The time before that Lance had screamed and screamed and _screamed_ then cut off so suddenly Shiro thought that…

That…

He’d pounded his fist on the wall, screaming Lance’s name, to only an answer of silence. 

Shiro didn’t pray — not anymore — but he’d spent the night doing just that.

It was all he could do.

He had been rendered immobile, his pleas had fallen on deaf ears, and he could do _nothing_ as a leader should be doing to protect his team.

The failure cut sharper than any knife.

Somehow Lance didn’t hold any of it against him.

Not that he was being hurt.

Not that Shiro (compared to Lance) wasn’t.

Not even that it had been because of Shiro and his inability to swim (as he had horrifyingly discovered as his prosthetic was dead weight in the water and he was trying very hard not to think on that either and how if Lance hadn’t been so quick and a strong swimmer himself that...) that had wound them up captured.

And despite all the horrors being done to them and around them, Lance’s endless compassion and attempts to make Shiro laugh when he was in his right mindset, were a burst of desperately needed light in both figuratively and literally this dark place. 

Shiro was terrified of when that light went out.

He prayed the team found them before that happened. He knew they had to be looking, and if there was anyone in the universe who could find them he knew it would be Voltron. 

Just…

He needed them to find them soon.

Before anything irreparable happened. 

“Did,” Lance spoke, his voice still a pant, still high and tight, “did you know that… that humans can run really, r-really fast when properly m-motivated? And that I,” he let out a hoarse cough, “am very m-motivated by not being im-impaled?”

They’d agreed early on that asking “are you okay?” was rather redundant to their situation and Shiro knew it wasn’t a good gauge anyway because while he’d seen Lance make a scene out of a papercut he knew if it was actually serious he would try to downplay it so as not to worry anyone. It was different reasoning than the kind he’d come to expect from Keith, but it ultimately led to the same conclusion that he would never get a straight answer if either was actually hurt or ill.

But Shiro had learned a lot over the years and he knew his way around this particular deflection.

“Where are you hurt?” Shiro asked quietly instead, mind already running with scenarios, and trying not to assume the worst.

Lance didn’t answer, except with more wheezing breaths and something that sounded like the beginnings of a sob.

If Lance could cry and talk it probably wasn’t a punctured lung, Shiro comforted himself as he awaited the response.

It really wasn’t comforting.

None of this was comforting because there was _nothing he could do._

The questions ultimately led nowhere but… but it felt like it gave Shiro a tiny bit more control and he hoped in some way it helped Lance too to know that even though Shiro couldn’t do anything about it he was still there and listening and wishing with every part of him that he could take Lance’s place.

“Lance, where are you hurt?” Shiro asked again, more firmly, and he heard Lance suck in and then let out a shaky exhale.

“Um,” and that was never a good start. 

“ _Lance.”_

Shiro’s heart was starting to pick up pace as whenever Lance stalled it never ended up being a good thing.

Like the fingernails they’d removed on his right hand. 

“My, my feet,” Lance finally said.

Shiro frowned as that had not been the answer he had been expecting.

But…

“Sore?” he clarified, hoping but knowing that couldn’t be it.

He could almost picture Lance shake his head.

“I…” a swallow. “I ran b-barefoot. A-and…”

He didn’t need to say it.

Shiro could picture it clearly enough, of what — and Lance had been gone for almost three hours — that length of running on a quick-moving, high-friction surface like a treadmill belt could do.

His stomach turned over.

Lance feet had to be rubbed _raw._ And then if he’d still run on them…

“Are they bleeding?” 

Lance’s quiet sob answered that.

Shiro internally cursed. 

Open wounds were their most dangerous enemy (outside of the Norians) here as Shiro couldn’t be certain they’d provide medical care as they studied the effects of such and if Lance got an infection on top of everything else…

“Do you have any of your shirt left?” Shiro asked, trying to keep his voice steady.

Calm.

Focus.

Do what he could. 

“Y-yeah,” Lance sniffled. 

“Good,” Shiro tried and failed to smile. “You’re going to—”

Loud clanging interrupted him from further down the hall and the resulting screams didn’t sound like prisoners being experimented on.

That…

It sounded like…

A rescue.

More yelling and clanging and Shiro sat straight up, heart racing, as it came closer.

And then Hunk was sliding to a stop in front of Shiro’s cell, a large grin on his face and a familiar prosthetic in hand. 

“Do you need a…” Hunk trailed off, eyes widening and face paling as he took in Shiro who he knew didn’t even look that bad but clearly worse than he thought he did, the word “hand,” barely a whisper. 

“Hunk,” Shiro tried the same steady voice, and he was rewarded as Hunk’s eyes pulled themselves from his bloodied arm and port and to Shiro’s face. “I’m okay. Open the door and go to Lance. On the left.”

“R-right,” Hunk nodded. “Um, stand back. Or, or sit back. I’ll just—”

He raised his bayard cannon at the door, angling it so it didn’t strike Shiro, and one heavy _blam_ later the lock had been blown out and the door swung wide open.

Hunk was already hurrying away and Shiro painfully and awkwardly pulled himself to his feet, gritting his teeth as his broken leg protested any weight and he listed sideways at the off balance and sudden vertigo.

He pushed through it and limped his way out of the cell.

There was fighting further down in the corridor — Keith and Allura, twirling a staff — and he could only assume Coran and Pidge were elsewhere as the Norians’ facility was a giant, winding maze of cells and hallways that even if he’d been able to escape Shiro had no idea how he’d be finding an exit.

He knew where to find Lance’s cell though.

His breath caught as he looked in, Hunk kneeling at Lance’s side and talking so fast it was unintelligible as he held Lance propped up in his arms, clearly preparing to lift him up.

Lance’s feet weren’t just raw.

They were in _tatters._

Bile swam into Shiro’s throat that he forced back down and instead caught Lance’s eyes, bright with both pain and relief, his face a little more gaunt (Shiro had the feeling his was the same, although with stubble too) and Shiro could see bruising where pincers or needles or both had found homes all over his chest and arms where his shirt was a ripped remain on the ground next to them.

But otherwise Lance was in tact, whole, and he was going to stay that way.

“Hey, buddy,” Shiro murmured, leaning himself on the blasted open cell door.

A tear tracked down Lance’s cheek. “Sh-Shiro.”

He groaned then, eyes shuttering, as Hunk gave a surge and rose to his feet, Lance cradled in his arms. 

Ocean peeked open though as Hunk carried him towards the cell entrance and Shiro reached out his hand, brushing it through Lance’s hair and coming to rest on the tear-stained cheek.

“You were really brave,” he said softly. 

Lance’s cheeks pinkened at the praise and Shiro smiled a real smile for the first time in days.

And as they made a staggered procession down the hall to the others, each footfall sending pain rocketing up Shiro’s leg, he continued to smile.

Even as he felt tears prick his eyes — matching relief and pain to Lance’s — he smiled.

Because against the odds the team had found them, they were being rescued, and they both were going to be all right.

And Shiro kept smiling.

**Author's Note:**

> Back in October last year I made the decision starting January 2021 I would no longer be posting the majority of my works on AO3 as it had become a toxic mental health place for me and I would instead be focusing on a smaller platform of readers who have supported my works in the past and were the ones giving me the opportunity to continue writing fanfiction. I had hoped this would be a positive change for my mental health. Unfortunately due to a severe lack of engagement and readership (it is an awful feeling to post and have barely anyone reading, to feel like you're posting into a void, to make you doubt your own works and talents) I have been feeling worse than ever before. And it's not a good feeling. I've been deliberating what to do because being able to share my works has been what has honestly kept me going. And so, for better or worse, I am taking a chance and returning to AO3. And there'll be a bit of an influx in the next couple weeks as I re-post all of the content I had on the other platform with the hope that maybe it gets a little love here ♥ Thought I'd start off with some platonic Shance to warm the soul ♥
> 
> If you enjoyed the fic I ask that you please take a moment to leave a comment. It doesn't have to be long (although if you're inspired to do so please, feel free, as I love detailed comments). It can be a short and sweet little one-liner, a thank you, an "I enjoyed it ♥ " No matter how long or short, those comments tell me that you were _here_. They tell me that you _read my story_. And they mean everything to me. So thank you for reading my story, thank you for reading this author's note, and thank you in advance for your comment. I shall look forward to it ♥


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